If the nation's media rolls over for the lies Al Gore is telling about
the high cost of gasoline and what's to come with heating oil and natural
gas costs, then we are being put on the path to an economic disaster in
America. The simple reason is that everything travels on wheels these
days. We all drive to work and every piece of goods that gets made and
delivered comes in a truck.

Reportedly, both the Secretary of the Treasury, Lawrence Summers, and
Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan, issued a memorandum calling
the President's decision to release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve
"a major and substantial policy mistake." It's worse than that.
It is a decision driven totally by politics, not policy. It was a decision
to advance Hillary Clinton's campaign in New York State and Al Gore's
floundering campaign nationwide. There will be no impact on oil prices

In the United States today, we import more than half of all the oil we
need to function and our economy requires what we're using now and more
in the near future. Why? Because our economy is growing. Some people here
at home and many others round the world resent this. The same holds true
for the need to provide more electricity. We need more coal-burning utilities
because coal is electrical power in America and we need nuclear powered
utilities too. Ralph Nader's running mate, Ms. LaDuke, came to fame opposing
all nuclear power. Al Gore thinks that nuclear power "is now obviously
at a technological dead end."

Why is the cost of gas so high? Why don't we have the utilities we require?
Why is the EPA attacking the utilities we have? Why haven't we been drilling
for our own reserves of oil? Why can't we open up a new coal mine anywhere?
Why did Clinton put the richest reserves of high-grade coal in the West
off limits to any development? My friends, I give you Al Gore and the
policies of the environmental movement, the Greens!

Right now in Alaska, according to one of the latest U.S. Geological Surveys,
there's at least 16 billion barrels of oil going untapped. That's comparable
to five years of U.S. imports. Guess what? The Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge is off-limits to any use of its huge reserves. The caribou are
too important. The Clinton-Gore administration has also seen to it that
the oil reserves off California and Florida can't be tapped either. We
have to protect the sea otters and seals. Want to know why you're paying
so much money to fill your tank? Ask Al Gore, Jr!

This
is, of course, the same Al Gore, who, on September 21st, said, "People
should be able to get in their cars and drive where they want, when they
want, at a low price." This is the same Al Gore who, writing in his
book, "Earth in the Balance" said, "Today, we must recognize
that our heavy reliance on cars as our primary means of transportation
accounts for a large proportion of the carbon dioxide emitted in the atmosphere
from the industrial world. Objectively, it makes little sense for each
of us to burn up all the energy necessary to travel with several thousands
pounds of metal wherever we go."

To demonstrate how insane Gore's views about the automobile truly are,
you need only read his book where, at one point, he says "We now
know that their cumulative impact on the global environment is posing
a mortal threat to the security of every nation more deadly than that
of any military enemy we are ever again likely to confront."

Objectively and scientifically, there is no global warming and the amount
of CO2 humans produce is nothing compared to the billions of metric tons
produced by the oceans of the world and other natural sources. More CO2
is a boon to agriculture and forest growth. Measurements of the earth's
overall temperature all indicate there has been no warming in over fifty
years. Nothing Al Gore Jr. has to say on this subject makes any sense
whatever.

Meanwhile, the OPEC nations, whose oil it is, have pointed out that the
reason we are paying high prices here and the Europeans are paying even
higher prices is because of the taxes imposed by our federal and state
governments and those of the other consumer nations. To put it another
way, the US and the European governments get huge amounts of money for
doing nothing while the producers of oil are depleting what, for most,
is their only natural resource.

OPEC nations have enough known reserves for, at the least, another fifty
years. That means we have time to (1) drill and utilize our own reserves
and (2) come up with new technology to reduce our dependency on oil. If
you doubt we can do this, you know nothing of history. It wasn't until
the last century that the automobile was even invented or came into widespread
use. Before that it was horses!

At this point you must also factor in the Clean Air policies of the Environmental
Protection Agency. Led by Gore's hand-picked director, Carol Browner,
the EPA has imposed mandates on the refining of oil resulting in gas shortages
in the mid-West this summer and the poisoning of the nation's water sources
due to an EPA-required additive. Al Gore has gone from blaming OPEC to
blaming "Big Oil" and, by next week, he will be blaming George
W. Bush for not having stayed in the oil business.

Gore is Big Oil. He is responsible for an estate worth hundreds of thousands
of dollars in Occidental Oil stock. First his daddy raised Big Tobacco
for a living and then, after the folks in Tennessee threw Albert Sr. out
of Congress, daddy worked for Occidental. This oil company is currently
trying to drill for oil in Colombia.

It gets worse. Back in August, Reuters reported that "a top advisor"
to Al Gore advocated creating "a new global environmental organization
to protect wildlife and address concerns about the impact of trade on
natural resources." Laura Tyson wants to have a permanent forum similar
to the World Trade Organization or the International Labor Organization
to deal with "cross-border disputes that affect the health of forests,
oceans and endangered species." Let me translate this for you. This
is a ploy to shut down the use of any natural resources anywhere for any
reason.

The Clinton-Gore administration has now tapped into our Strategic Petroleum
Reserves, something reserved only for war or an economic emergency. This
is a blatant effort to (1) gain votes and (2) cover up the fact they have
had no energy policy for the past seven years other than to stump on any
effort to find and extract our own nation's vast reserves of oil. To claim
that the Clinton-Gore administration isn't significantly responsible for
the rise in the cost of oil is the most audacious lie of all.

While taking credit for the economic boom that started because of the
Reagan administration's policies, they also managed for seven years to
ignore the growing energy needs of the nation. Between Al Gore, Hazel
O'Leary and now Bill Richardson, we have had three of the biggest nincompoops
in the nation to blame for the current situation.

We are being whipsawed between the real costs of black gold and the Green
lies of environmental policies.

Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, and the founder
of The National Anxiety Center, a clearinghouse for information about
scare campaigns intended to influence public opinion and policies. The
Center maintains an Internet site at www.anxietycenter.com.
Mr. Caruba can be reached at acaruba@aol.com.
Copyright, Alan Caruba, 2000.